PHARISAISM AS A SPIRITUAL RELIGION
In this concluding chapter I shall make an attempt to indicate what
Pharisaism was on its spiritual side, as the expression of the
Pharisee's personal feeling towards God; or, if I may put it in
colloquial terms, what the Pharisee "felt like" as a religious and moral
being. I shall try to show the meaning of the peculiar type of character
formed under the influence of the religion of Torah, both as regards its
excellencies and its deficiencies. I say its deficiencies, for my aim
throughout this book has been not to extol the Pharisees as if they had
no faults, but to present, as clearly and strongly as I could, what they
meant by their religion and what it meant to them. To say that they held
to it with sincere loyalty, and that they found in it entire
satisfaction, is not to say that it had no limitations, so that there
could not be a more excellent way. But it is to say that Pharisaism was
a genuine religion, so far as it went, able to satisfy the real wants of
living souls. And how far it went, and where it stopped short, is a
question upon which the adherent of another form of faith may have a
decided opinion, and yet may be entirely mistaken. The Christian may be
able, and I hope that the reader will have been able, to recognise that
Pharisaism was a genuine religion. But the peculiar form in which that
religion was expressed makes it exceedingly difficult for the Christian
to recognise in Pharisaism what is familiar to him in his own religion;
and, in consequence, he is extremely likely to misjudge and depreciate
what to the Pharisee was right and good. My task in this chapter is very
far from easy; and I am by no means confident that in performing it I
could satisfy a Pharisee that I have done full justice to his case.
The subject is somewhat intangible, being indeed the inner consciousness
of the Pharisee in regard to religion. I shall deal with it under three
heads: first, the devotional literature available; second, the influence
of the conception of Torah as a factor in the formation of religious
character; and, third, the result of that influence.
The devotional literature properly so called of the Pharisees, at all
events within the period covered by the Talmud, is not extensive. I mean
by devotional literature, writings in the form of hymns and prayers. Of
hymns there are, in this period, so far as I know, none; of prayers
there are a few; some of them included in the liturgy of the Synagogue,
and others being individual private prayers. This very meagre list may,
however, be extended; certainly in one direction, and I believe also in
another. Some of the Psalms ought to be included as being lyrical
expressions of the religion of Torah, whether the writers were
technically Pharisees or not. And, in the other direction, the liturgy
of the Synagogue is the precipitate of Jewish piety through many
centuries, and shows better than anything else how much of deep
spiritual fervour was engendered by the religion of Torah. I shall make
use of the Psalms, or some of them. But of the Synagogue liturgy I shall
use only such parts as fall within the period covered by the Talmud.
Because my concern is with the Pharisees of the early centuries, not
with those of the Middle Ages. And, though I believe it to be the case,
I could not prove that a Pharisee of the first century of our era would
feel that his thoughts about religion found due expression in the hymns
of Jehudah ha-Levi and Ibn Gebirol. Personally, I believe he would; but
the fact remains that the Pharisees in the Talmudic period composed no
hymns, and that fact must be allowed for whatever it is worth. The
reappearance of devotional poetry must correspond, one would think, to
some change in the spiritual atmosphere. But, in regard to the use of
the Psalms, there need be no such hesitation. Some of the Psalms are
unmistakably due to the influence of the conception of Torah in
determining the form of religion; and the whole Book of Psalms was used
by the Pharisees in the Synagogue service, and for their own study. This
latter fact does not prove very much, because the whole of the Old
Testament was also used and studied; and no one would contend that the
Old Testament is throughout an utterance of Pharisaism. Still, it should
be remembered that the Canon of the Old Testament was fixed by Scribes
and Pharisees; and that the book of Psalms was finally completed, and in
part composed, for use in the Synagogue and the Temple, as the lyrical
expression of the religion of Torah.
I shall therefore make such use of the Psalms as will help my purpose,
and will supplement the study of them by an examination of the few
Pharisaic prayers to be found in the Talmud and the early liturgy.
Something was said about the Psalms in the second chapter, and I shall
not repeat it. Here I would go into more detail upon particular points.
On looking through the Book of Psalms, it is seen at once that there are
some which proclaim themselves unmistakably as Torah Psalms. Notably,
Ps. cxix. and the second part of Ps. xix. It is quite inconceivable that
these should have been written before Ezra had instituted the religion
of Torah. Ps. i., also, the general introduction to the whole collection
when finally completed, evidently moves within the circle of ideas
associated with Torah. Occasional phrases in other Psalms may also
reveal the same fact, even though the particular Psalm, as a whole, may
not be specially devoted to the thought of Torah. Thus, in Ps. xxv. 10,
the reference to "covenants" and testimonies, and in Ps. xviii. 22,
"statutes and judgments." Indications like these, however, cannot be
safely relied on; because, as stated in the second chapter, there was
Torah before Ezra, and such phrases as those just quoted occur in
Deuteronomy. The Psalms in which phrases are found, such as "Torah,"
"covenant," "testimony," "statute," "judgment," "precept," and the like,
may be interpreted in various ways, and not necessarily in terms of the
specific religion of Torah due to Ezra. But there is no need to draw any
hard and fast line between those which are and those which are not Torah
Psalms; for the religious frame of mind peculiar to the Torah Psalmist
can be studied in detail in Ps. cxix. That is a Pharisee Psalm, beyond
any question. I do not mean that the writer can be shown to have been a
Pharisee in the technical sense, a member of a pledged company of
separatists.[20] Very likely he was; but whether he were so or not, he
looked upon the Torah exactly as the Pharisees did, as the supreme and
perfect revelation of God.
[20] It is worth noting in passing that the name by which the
Pharisees called themselves and each other was "ḥābēr,"
"companion"; and their societies were "ḥaburoth," "companies." In
Ps. cxix. 63, the Psalmist says, "I am _companion_, 'ḥaber,' to all
them that fear thee." Whether the Psalmist used the term because he
was a Pharisee, or whether the Pharisees borrowed it from the
Psalm, I do not know; but there is evidently a connection between
them.
Ps. cxix., as everyone knows, is made up of groups containing eight
verses, each beginning with one of the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew
alphabet. There are thus one hundred and seventy-six verses in all. From
an artistic point of view, the structure of the Psalm is stiff and
mechanical; the divine name is introduced twenty-two times,
corresponding to the twenty-two groups of verses. The changes are rung
upon a series of ten words--Torah, statute, righteousness, precept,
judgment, way, ordinance, word, saying, and faithfulness--the number
corresponding, perhaps, to the ten commandments given on Sinai. With one
exception, v. 122, every verse contains one or other of the ten words in
the list just given. The result is a certain monotony, and the Psalm is
not amongst those most generally admired and loved by the ordinary
reader. Whether there is any progression of thought is open to
question; it would not, apparently, make very much difference if the
verses were rearranged according to another pattern. But once we get
past the barrier of artificial method there is thought and feeling in
abundance. The one object of thought is the Torah; and the feeling is
devout wonder in regard to it, and adoration of God who gave it. The ten
words are only so many aspects of Torah, and serve mainly to give
variety to the thought of the divine revelation.
The Psalmist meditates upon the Torah, thus variously indicated, from
two points of view: first, that of its divine excellence and the
goodness of God in revealing it; and, second, that of his own endeavour
to fulfil the precepts contained in it. In reference to the first head,
it is clear that the Psalmist was filled with delight, gratitude, and
praise. The Torah and all connected with it inspired him with joy. There
is not the faintest trace of any feeling of oppression, as if he were
burdened by the precepts; and, for what is not precept but simply
instruction, he received it with devout rapture, as being a precious
gift which God had been pleased to bestow. That God had given that
revelation was to the Psalmist the greatest of all his blessings. There
is in the Psalm but little reference to the past history of Israel, as
showing the divine providence. The Psalmist was deeply conscious of God
in the immediate present, and of his own close relation to Him. Of
course, the Torah, so far as it was a written record, included the
history of all the divine dealings with Israel, down to the time of
Moses; but it was not this aspect of religion which chiefly appealed to
the Psalmist. The providential mercy of God served to give fuller and
richer meaning to the thought of Him as the object of worship. The
following phrases will serve to indicate the Psalmist's attitude towards
God:--v. 7, "I will give thanks unto Thee with uprightness of heart." v.
12, "Blessed be Thou, O Lord; teach me Thy statutes." v. 18, "Open Thou
mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of Thy Torah." v. 41,
"Let Thy loving kindness come unto me, O Lord; Thy salvation, according
to Thy promise." v. 49, "Remember Thy word unto Thy servant; for Thou
hast caused me to hope." v. 57, "Thou art my portion, O Lord." v. 64,
"The earth is full of Thy mercy, O Lord." v. 68, "Thou art good and
doest good." v. 75, "I know, O Lord, that Thy judgments are
righteousness, and that in faithfulness Thou hast afflicted me. Let Thy
loving kindness be for my comfort, according to Thy promise unto Thy
servant. Let Thy tender mercies come unto me, that I may live." v. 90,
"Thou hast established the earth and it abideth. They stand this day,
obedient to Thine ordinances; for all beings are Thy servants." v. 132,
"Turn Thou unto me, and have mercy on me; as Thou usest to do unto those
that love Thy name." And v. 176, "I am like a lost sheep; seek Thy
servant." These are only a few of the characteristic phrases of the
Psalmist. He evidently feels towards God reverence, trust, and hope;
and, no less evidently, does not feel that God is far off and
unapproachable, an abstraction rather than a living presence. God was,
for the Psalmist, the creator of the world; but He was also the guide
and protector of those that know Him and keep His commandments. And it
was the privilege of such that they should have been allowed to know
Him, and hold communion with Him. The Torah was the means by which that
privilege was made available to Israel; and the "precepts,"
"ordinances," etc., were the particular occasions on and through which
that privilege might be realised and enjoyed, and the devout worshipper
might come into communion with God. The Psalmist never lost sight of the
purpose of the precepts, in the mere doing of what they enjoined. For
him the doctrine of the _opus operatum_ would have been a frivolous and
mischievous perversion of the truth; in modern phrase, a
"soul-destroying heresy." There is nothing of the taskmaster in the
Psalmist's conception of God; he does not indeed call Him the Father in
Heaven, but that term would more truly express his thought than any
phrase of bondage and compulsion. And we can see how naturally the term
Father in Heaven would take its place in the language of devotion, when
once it had occurred to someone so to use it.
The Psalmist's conception of God, though it is mostly defined in
relation to Torah, does not contradict in any way that which is set
forth or implied in the rest of the Psalms, or in the highest teaching
of the prophets. Compare Ps. ciii., by common consent one of the noblest
utterances of pure spiritual theism that the Old Testament
contains:--"But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting
upon them that fear Him, and His righteousness unto children's children;
unto such as keep His covenant, and to those that remember His precepts
to do them." In Ps. ciii., the changeless mercy and love of God are
especially dwelt on--His forbearance towards human frailty; while in
Ps. cxix. the main thought is of God as having given Torah, divine
teaching. But neither Psalmist excludes what the other chiefly dwells
upon. The Psalmist in Ps. cxix. cannot be said to have narrowed the
conception of God. He was in accord with all that the prophets and the
other Psalmists had believed of the greatness and goodness of God. What
this Psalmist did was to utter his praise of God, so conceived, from the
point of view of the means of grace which He had given, the conditions
which He had appointed for personal knowledge and service of Himself.
Unless this be understood, Ps. cxix. is wholly misjudged; and the fact
that it appeals less than almost any other Psalm to the reader, at all
events the Christian reader, is due to unfamiliarity with the Psalmist's
point of view. Once that is found, the whole Psalm shines from end to
end with pure devotion and fervent, genuine piety.
Second, as to the Psalmist's feeling in regard to his own efforts to
fulfil the precepts, and to live in accordance with the Torah. As these
were to him the means of realising his personal relation to God, and of
entering into communion with Him, he was not in despair when he failed
in obedience. He prayed for forgiveness, believing that, if he repented,
God would forgive him. When he broke a precept, he sinned and knew that
he sinned; but he was not conscious of having thereby set up an
insurmountable barrier between himself and God. A barrier certainly; but
one which penitence on his part and forgiveness on that of God both
could and did remove. All the ideas about bondage under the Law, to
which Christians have been accustomed, rest upon a conception of the
meaning and purpose of the Torah which Jews have never held, at least
those who remained Jews. The writer of Ps. cxix. never held it.
This Psalm is marked by careful, sometimes almost painful,
introspection. The Psalmist is continually dwelling upon the precepts as
they affect himself, his love for them, his desire to keep them, his
delight in them, his longing to learn them, and to be more perfectly in
accord with them, his fear lest he should wander from the way of them.
Indeed, the whole Psalm is made up of such meditation, in forms varied
but continually repeated. Which goes to show that a Psalm written under
the immediate influence of the idea of Torah could scarcely fail to be
introspective. And this Psalm is an illustration, on a fairly large
scale, of the fact that the change effected by the work of Ezra, in
turning the religion of Israel into the channel of Torah, tended to make
that religion far more personal and individual than it had been before.
The value of Ps. cxix., as evidence for the spiritual meaning of
Pharisaism, is this, that it shows what was possible under the religion
of Torah, by way of piety and devotion. The Pharisees held precisely
such ideas about the Torah as are expressed in this Psalm; and I know of
no ground for saying that they were without the piety and devotion with
which the Psalmist quickened those ideas.
As has already been said, the Talmudic literature does not contain any
hymns by Pharisees; at least, I have never met with any. Perhaps the
Pharisees felt that the Psalms gave them all that they needed; perhaps
they lacked the gift of sacred poetry. But though there are no hymns in
the Talmud and the Midrash, there are prayers, both public and private;
and these will throw some light upon the spiritual side of Pharisaism.
The earliest prayers of all are those which form the opening and the
close of the so-called Eighteen Benedictions, the "Shemoneh Esreh."
These are ascribed, in the Rabbinical tradition, to the Men of the Great
Synagogue; and though so great an age cannot be proved for them, it is
certain that they are very old. They are the earliest existing portions
of the liturgy used in the Synagogue; and though they are somewhat bare
in their unadorned simplicity, they serve to show something of the
religious spirit of the men who were making "a hedge about the Torah,"
and they indicate that there was something else in that operation
besides waning faith and waxing formalism. I quote one or two of
them:--"Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God and the God of our fathers, the
God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. God most high, creator of Heaven
and earth, our shield and the shield of our fathers."... "We give thanks
to Thee, O Lord, our God, for all the benefits, the favours, which Thou
hast shown to us. Blessed art Thou, to whom it is good to give thanks.
Bestow Thy peace upon Israel, Thy people, and bless us all as one.
Blessed art Thou, O Lord, who makest peace." These prayers, as they are
found in the liturgy now, are very much longer; I have given what are
believed to be the oldest parts of the three which I have quoted out of
the eighteen. If there is not much warmth in these prayers, as there
certainly is not, neither is there any of the vainglory and
self-righteousness which are supposed to be characteristic of the
Pharisees. And it should be borne in mind that there can be no great
difference in date between these prayers and Ps. cxix.
However, I will come down to a time when the Pharisees, if they ever
became such as the New Testament represents them, must have long
acquired that character. Here is a prayer which dates from the second
century of our era, and is part of the liturgy still in daily
use:--"Lord of the worlds! not trusting in our righteousness, do we cast
our entreaties down before Thee, but trusting in Thine abundant mercies.
Who are we? What is our life? What is our virtue? What is our
righteousness? What is our deliverance? What is our strength? What is
our might? What shall we say before Thee, O Lord God and the God of our
fathers? Are not all the mighty as nothing before Thee? and the men of
name as though they had never been? And the wise are without knowledge,
and the understanding as those who are without discernment. For the
multitude of their deeds is nothing, and the days of their life are a
breath before Thee" (b. Joma. 87^b, mentioned by R. Joḥanan). Christians
usually get their notion of what a Pharisee's prayer was like from Luke
xviii. 11, 12; and I do not deny that Pharisees may sometimes have
prayed after that manner. Nevertheless, what I have just recited is more
true to the real spirit of Pharisaism than the prayer in the Parable.
And even to that there is another side. A well-known prayer, still used
in the liturgy, runs thus:--"Blessed art Thou, O Lord, our God, King of
the world, that Thou hast not made me a Gentile ... a slave ... a
woman." Much scorn has been poured out upon those who have offered that
prayer, as if it were nothing but the utterance of arrogant vainglory.
But, however it may sound to Gentiles, what the Jews meant, and mean, by
it is this, that God is thanked for having given in the Torah the
opportunity of serving Him, in the "Mitzvōth," which were not enjoined
upon Gentiles, slaves, or women. It is not self-righteousness which is
expressed in that prayer, but the acknowledgment of special obligation,
a higher calling, in no way inconsistent with humility and reverence.
The prayer in the Parable was doubtless intended by its author to
represent Pharisaic piety in an unfavourable light; but the example I
have just given is enough to show that a Pharisee would put a different
interpretation upon it.
Here is another prayer from the second century (b. Ber. 16^b), and still
in use:--"May it be pleasing in Thy sight, O Lord my God and the God of
my fathers, that Thou wilt deliver me this day and every day from the
shameless and from shamelessness, from the evil man, from the evil
companion, from the evil neighbour, from evil chance, and from Satan the
destroyer; from stern judgment and from the implacable adversary,
whether he be a son of the covenant or no." This is merely a fragment of
prayer, as indeed the others are which I have quoted. It is only a
variation on the theme "Deliver us from evil," the evil being specified
in concrete forms. And, since it has been incorporated in the liturgy,
it was presumably intended for public use, and was not the private
utterance of its author, who was R. Jehudah, the compiler of the
Mishnah. This distinction is important, because it is often charged
against the Pharisees that they reduced prayer, like so much else, to a
mere mechanical routine; that they regulated, down to the minutest
detail, the words and even the posture and the gestures of the
worshipper; and that they left nothing to the spontaneous volition of
the soul that would seek God. Certainly there are many such regulations
in the Talmud, both as regards what should be said and how it should be
said. But these all refer to the public worship of the congregation, and
not to the private prayer of the individual. Moreover, they are
indications of the process by which the liturgy was compiled, its
contents determined, and the manner of its use appointed. The
worshipper, using the liturgy, was concerned only with the finally
completed order, and not with the stages of its preparation. When the
Book of Common Prayer was compiled, there were discussions as to what
should be included in it and what left out; whether this phrase or that
was to be preferred; whether at such a point the congregation should
stand or kneel; whether the minister should face the congregation or
not; and so on.
Presumably, votes were taken, and resolutions passed upon hundreds of
such points. Are these regulations a restriction upon worship? Does the
worshipper know, or take any interest in knowing, the details of the
process by which the liturgy was produced? He accepts the final result;
and finds in it a help to his worship, unconscious of the fact that
perhaps every line has been canvassed by a committee and settled after
debate. Much the same might be said of the preparation of any liturgy;
and what is found in the Talmud, which offends the piety of the
Christian, is only the same kind of preparatory work as that necessary
in the case of any liturgy. If the Pharisees were extremely careful, as
they certainly were, in deciding what should go into their liturgy, and
how it should be used, why are they more to be blamed than those who
directed, "Here the minister shall say" so and so? The Pharisees
produced a liturgy which, gradually enlarged, has lasted down to the
present day; and though a case may be made out for its revision, still
it has served, for many more centuries than the Book of Common Prayer
can claim, as the expression of the united worship of Israel.
But, while public prayer was thus carefully regulated, there was never
any restriction, imposed or thought of, upon private prayer. It is
expressly said (M. Aboth. ii. 13), "When thou prayest, make not thy
prayer a fixed form, but a prayer for mercy and an entreaty before God."
I do not think that this refers to public prayer; but, even if it does,
it would still show that the Pharisees were careful to keep the
spiritual intention of prayer, while using the prescribed form. But I
believe the reference is to private prayer; and it is certain that this
was left to the spontaneous freedom of the worshipper himself. Prayer
was always an essential element in the religious life of the Pharisee;
not because it was required of him, but because it was the natural
instinct of his soul. "Would that a man could pray all day," said R.
Joḥanan (j. Ber. 2ª). Pharisees knew what it was to withdraw to their
inner chamber, and "pray to their Father which seeth in secret." And it
was not a Pharisee who added:--"Thy Father, which seeth in secret, shall
_recompense thee_."
Of such entirely private prayers there is no written record. But several
prayers are mentioned in the Talmud as having been composed for their
own use by famous Rabbis. Here are some of them as they are found
together (j. Ber. 7^d):--"May it be Thy will, O Lord my God and the God
of my fathers, that Thou wilt not put hatred of us into the heart of any
man, nor hatred of any man in our hearts; and that Thou wilt not put
jealousy against us into the heart of any man, nor jealousy of any man
into our hearts. And may Thy Torah be our employment all the days of our
life; and may our words be entreaty before Thee." To which was added by
another Rabbi: "And unite our heart to fear Thy name; and keep us far
from all that Thou hatest, and bring us near to all that Thou lovest,
and do with us righteousness for Thy name's sake."
The disciples of R. Jannai used to say this (on rising from
sleep):--"Blessed art Thou, O Lord, who quickenest the dead. Lord, I
have sinned against Thee; may it be Thy will, O Lord my God, that Thou
wouldst give me a good heart, a good portion, a good disposition, a good
understanding, a good name, a good eye, a good hope, a good soul, a
humble soul, and a contrite spirit. May Thy name not be profaned among
us; and make us not a byword in the mouth of the people; may our latter
end be not to be cut off, nor our hope the giving up of the ghost. Make
us not to depend on human gifts, and give us not our sustenance by the
hand of men; for their comfort is small and the shame they inflict is
great. And grant our lot to be in Thy Torah, with those who do Thy will.
Build Thy house, Thy temple. Thy city, and Thy sanctuary, speedily, in
our days."
R. Ḥija b. Abba used to pray:--"May it be Thy will, O Lord our God and
the God of our fathers, that Thou wouldst put it into our hearts to
offer sincere repentance before Thee, that we may not be ashamed before
our fathers in the world to come."
R. Tanḥum b. Iscolastiki used to pray:--"May it be Thy will, O Lord my
God and the God of my fathers, that Thou wilt break and take away the
yoke of the evil inclination from our hearts. For Thou didst create us
to do Thy will, and we are bound to do Thy will. Thou desirest, and we
desire it. And what hinders us? The leaven in the dough. It is revealed
and known before Thee, that there is no strength in us to withstand it.
But may it please Thee, O Lord my God and the God of my fathers, that
Thou wilt cause it to pass away from us, and that Thou wilt subdue it;
and we will make Thy will our will, with a perfect heart." R. Joḥanan
used to pray:--"May it be pleasing unto Thee, O Lord my God and the God
of my fathers, that Thou wilt cause love, goodwill, peace, and
friendship to dwell in our habitations; that Thou wilt grant us a happy
end and the fulfilling of our hope; that Thou wilt fill our borders with
disciples, and that we may rejoice in our portion in Paradise. Make us
to acquire a good heart and a good friend; and may we awake to find what
our hearts have longed for, and may there come in Thy presence rest unto
our soul."
I have translated these prayers as nearly literally as our language
would allow, so that the reader may have them as far as possible in
their original form. There is nothing very sublime about them, none of
the eloquence of fervent rapture. But neither is there any of the
vainglorious boasting supposed to be characteristic of the Pharisees.
They are sincere, simple, and earnest, so far as they go, petitions for
the granting of things necessary for the soul as well as for the body.
They may fairly be taken as representative of Pharisaic piety, in the
absence of what is not within our reach, namely, the devotional language
of the Pharisee's prayer to God in the solitude of his own chamber.
The illustrations which have been given from the scanty remains of the
literature of piety left by the Pharisees will have been sufficient to
show a very considerable difference of tone, character, spirit, between
what was produced under the religion of Torah and what is found in the
New Testament. And the impression so created is confirmed by the other
citations I have made, in the course of this book, from the Pharisaic
literature. To one who is accustomed to the New Testament, there is a
certain flatness about the Rabbinical literature, a want of the
sublime, and still more of the beauty of holiness, the fervour of faith,
the personal consecration which marks the New Testament. There is
nothing in all the Rabbinical literature at all like the rapt utterance
in 1 Cor. xiii. That belongs unmistakably to the new dispensation, and
not to the old. The same may be said of much else in the New Testament.
If I may so express it, there is a different "feel" about it, quite
unlike what there is about any Rabbinical writing. As to the fact of
this, I imagine there can be no dispute; but it is well worth the
trouble to try and get at the meaning of it. For it cannot be dismissed
at once as being due to the spiritual deadness of the Pharisees, the
result of engrained hypocrisy and self-righteousness. I trust that
enough has been said in previous chapters to show that the Pharisees
were sincere and in earnest about their religion, however strange to
Christians be the forms in which they expressed their ideas. The very
strangeness of those forms may well prevent Christians from recognising
the meaning and worth of the ideas expressed in them, since Christians
could not use those forms for their own religious ideas.
The question is not whether the Christian or the Pharisaic conception is
the better; because, both for Christian and for Pharisee alike, that is
a foregone conclusion. The question is rather, why did the conception of
Torah, which from the time of Ezra was the controlling factor in the
development of Pharisaism, produce that particular type of piety and
religious character generally, of which so many illustrations have been
given? In what way did the influence of that conception make itself felt
upon those who devotedly accepted it and shaped their lives in
accordance with it? Here I get to the second main head of the present
chapter.
The Torah, which, it will be remembered, includes both the written word
and the unwritten interpretation embodied in the Tradition, was regarded
as containing the full and final revelation which God had made. It was
a body of divine truth, partly explicit, partly implicit, according as
its contents had or had not been drawn forth and clothed in words. But
it was truth, to be apprehended and learned, to be received in the mind
by the understanding before it could be made the guide of conduct or
could minister in any way to spiritual wants. The reader will remember
that all the terms used in connection with the appropriation of the
contents of Torah are variations on the theme of teaching and learning.
"Talmud," "Mishnah," "Midrash," all express these ideas, and Torah
itself is divine teaching. The significance of this is that the religion
of Torah had its deepest root in the intellectual, rather than in the
moral or spiritual, region of the mind. The moral and the spiritual were
by no means neglected or unprovided for; very far from that. But, if I
may so put it, they came in under the intellectual. The moral sense of
the Pharisee was strong, and his piety genuine, but the exercise of both
was conditioned by the contents of the Torah, duly interpreted. He must
be put in possession of certain knowledge, in order to act either
morally or devoutly. For him, the "seat of authority in religion," and
also in morals, was the Torah; and, while it is quite true that to a
large extent he made the Torah the exponent of his own moral and
religious conceptions, reading into it or finding there a great deal
which does not appear on the surface, it is also true that he regarded
it as an external authority to which he must submit. He had no
difficulty in doing this, since he believed the Torah to be the full and
final revelation of God. It was all good and holy and divine; and there
could be no surer guide for him in all that he had to do and all that he
could think and believe in respect of his relation to God. The function
of conscience was, for the Pharisee, not to pass moral judgments
independent of, still less contrary to, the Torah, but to co-operate
with it, and to confirm its authority. Conscience would be, in him,
clear upon the distinction between right and wrong; but _what_ was
right and _what_ was wrong would be decided by the authority of Torah,
not by the immediate intuition of conscience and reason. And I think
that a Pharisee would be quite unable to understand how any action could
be right which was not in accordance with Torah.[21] Certainly it could
not be right for him.
[21] _Cf._ what was said, in Chapter III., of the position taken up
by the Pharisees in regard to the question of healing on the
Sabbath. See above, p. 149.
So, too, in regard to his relation to God and his worship of Him, the
thoughts and feelings of the Pharisee, the sincere and devout utterance
of his spiritual being, would flow, naturally and with no sense of
compulsion, in the channels provided by the Torah, in such forms of
belief and such expressions of aspiration as were in harmony therewith.
I lay stress on the phrase "naturally, and with no sense of compulsion";
because it is very difficult for the Christian, whose supreme authority
is not the Torah, to realise the position of the Pharisee in this
matter, and to understand that he did not feel himself to be under
constraint. Of course, wherever there is authority, there is that which
on occasion will constrain; and the Christian is, to that extent, no
less under constraint than the Pharisee. But it is not an oppressive
burden, though it may be a hard duty, to submit to an authority which is
owned to be supreme. And the Pharisee, regarding the Torah as the
supreme authority, since it was the expression of the will and mind of
God, did not feel himself oppressed by the duty of submitting to it. He
would entirely agree with what was said, in a very different connection
(John viii. 32):--"Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you
free." He claimed that he _did_ know the truth; it was given him in the
Torah, from God Himself; and in making his life and thought and action
conform thereto, he found his true freedom. "None is free," says the
Talmud, "save he who is employed in the study of Torah" (M. Aboth. vi.
2). Whether the range of freedom is not wider when its limits are
prescribed by direct allegiance to a person instead of to a mental
conception like that of Torah is another question altogether, and one
upon which the Pharisee and the Christian will have each his own
opinion. And while it must not be forgotten that the Pharisee also owed
allegiance to a person, felt himself to be in immediate relation to God,
looked up to Him and prayed to Him, yet he would expect to find the
intimations of the divine will in the Torah, and not in his own
intuitions. It is not that the Pharisee was without the essentials of a
spiritual experience, real faith in God, real communion with Him, real
devotion to His service; for these he certainly had. It was that these
were realised by him only when expressed in terms of Torah. Whatever
could be so expressed took its place at once as part of his religious or
moral consciousness. Whatever could not be so expressed remained
outside, or, at best, held no prominent position in his thought.
The principle here laid down will be sufficient, I believe, to explain
the chief characteristic differences between the Pharisaic and the
Christian type of mind, disregarding, of course, individual variations.
It has been pointed out, in a previous chapter (p. 171), that
Christianity in all its forms centres upon a person, namely, Christ; and
that Judaism in all its forms, and Pharisaism most of all, centres upon
an idea, namely Torah, and will recognise no person as the object of its
devotion, save only God Himself. This is not a proud resistance to the
appeal of a great personality; it is simply a natural and necessary
result of making the Torah the central feature of religious thought.
There cannot be two centres, two authorities both regarded as supreme.
If the Torah be raised to the highest place, as the expression of the
divine will and the medium of the divine revelation, then there can be
no other to divide the allegiance. And not only so, but the demand, or
the appeal, to recognise such a one can only appear as an infringement
of the sovereign rights of the Torah. A Pharisee might admit that it was
conceivable that God should have chosen some other means than that of
Torah as the medium of His revelation. He could not admit that God
actually had done so, without surrendering the Torah altogether. And
this is the ground on which I said, in the third chapter, that the
opposition between Pharisaism and the religion of Jesus was fundamental
and irreconcilable. Not, indeed, that the religion of Jesus himself
centred on a person, as the religion of Paul and all later Christians
did; but that Jesus himself was that person; and his personality could
by no means be expressed in terms of Torah.
It is evident that devotion to a Person will produce a type of mind very
different from that produced by devotion to an Idea; and the difference
will be this, that the seat of moral authority and the source of
spiritual inspiration will be transferred from the Torah without to the
heart, conscience, and reason within. With the result, of course, of
imparting to these a freshness and vigour which they had not, and could
not have, before. Certainly, heart, conscience, and reason were by no
means inactive when applied to Torah; but responsibility for what they
did rested on Torah and not on themselves. They followed, gladly and
willingly, the lead which God had given in the Torah; but they followed
a lead. But in devotion to a person, heart, conscience, and reason, so
to speak, act from themselves, and the responsibility rests upon them.
And the note of the character so formed is not obedience, but
consecration of self. And this, I believe, is the reason why there is
such a marked difference of tone and spirit between the New Testament
and the Rabbinical literature. The former is the result of the
quickening power of a newly awakened devotion to a person, while the
latter is the result of steadfast and most faithful devotion to an
idea. Nor is that all. The devotion to a person leads to a different
form of expression, as the experience to be clothed in words is
different. The New Testament contains abundance of moral and religious
teaching, as the Talmud also does; but the New Testament puts it in the
form of direct appeal to the Christian to do and be so and so, that he
may be a disciple of Christ, and well pleasing unto God. The Talmud puts
it in the form of maxims of conduct, or lessons drawn from Scripture, to
be accepted and acted on because they are portions of Torah, divine
truth and wisdom offered to man, for his good, but not making any direct
appeal to him. And whereas, in the New Testament, the spiritual fervour
of the teacher could utter itself in the glowing rapture of Paul, in the
Talmud the spiritual fervour of the teacher (sometimes not less than
that of Paul) was spent upon the study of Torah: in the one case God was
sought and found through the person of a revealer; in the other, he was
sought and found through the medium of a body of knowledge. The
watchword of the New Testament is Love. The watchword of the Talmud is
Wisdom. And each can claim, as its ideal, the highest and fullest and
noblest meaning of its own watchword.
I pass to the consideration of another effect produced by the conception
of Torah as the controlling factor in Pharisaic religion. Within the
lines of Torah there was room for a highly developed spiritual life, a
pure morality, a devout piety. Also, for warm sympathy and generous
kindness, and in general for the virtues which make human nature
lovable.
All these were present, in varying degree, as truly as they are present
in Christians. But how about those who stood without the pale of the
Torah? What did the Pharisee consider to be his relation to them? In
practice, of course, this would depend largely on the individual
Pharisee; and no doubt examples might be found of every degree of
exclusiveness, from tolerant regret for those who were deprived of the
unspeakable blessing of the divine revelation down to the arrogant
contempt which said (John vii. 49), "This people that knoweth not the
Torah is accursed." But I shall deal only with the theory, not with the
practice, of the application of the Torah to "them that are without." It
was said above, that what could not be expressed in terms of Torah
either remained outside the religious consciousness of the Pharisee, or,
if admitted, held no prominent place there. It goes therefore without
saying, that Israel's possession of Torah must influence its attitude
towards the rest of mankind. The Pharisees were by no means blind to the
fact that among the Gentiles there were "those who feared God and worked
righteousness"; but, if the Torah was the final and complete divine
revelation, there could not be an equality, still less a real feeling of
brotherhood, between those who did and those who did not accept the
Torah as the guide of their lives. And this would remain true, even
though there were, as there was in the best minds among the Pharisees, a
real concern for the Gentile, and a desire that he too might share in
the blessing vouchsafed to Israel. The Pharisee by no means rejected the
visions of the prophets as, that "the earth shall be full of the
knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." But how could that
be realised unless the Gentiles came in by the way of Torah, and united
themselves with Israel? It was concern for the Gentiles, amongst other
motives, which prompted the assertion, to be found often in the Midrash,
that when God gave the Torah, He offered it to all the nations of the
world. They all, except Israel, rejected it; but at least they had their
chance. It was no arbitrary decree of God which deprived them of it. His
will was to do them good, if they would have it; and presumably they
might yet have it, if they would. In such ways the Pharisee looked out
across the barrier which separated him from the Gentile, not without
the hope and the desire that "all men might be saved," but unable to see
how that could be brought about, except by the coming of the Gentile
within the lines of the Torah. To obliterate those lines was
necessarily, to the Pharisee, unthinkable. It would be to renounce the
very blessing for the sake of which they desired that the Gentiles
should come in. And, even if there were no Gentiles, the Torah was still
the very life and soul of Israel; to part with it would be death; a fact
to which Israel has borne witness through the centuries. In the nature
of things, the religion of Torah as held by the Pharisees could not free
itself from Particularism; and though it could and did cherish a vision
of Universalism, the vision was for the far future, and only floated
fitfully before the gaze of the Pharisee. It hardly counted amongst
those present realities of his religion of which he was most conscious,
and to which he gave his chief thought.
I have tried to indicate what I believe to have been the effects of the
conception of Torah as the controlling factor in the religion of the
Pharisees, having, so far as I am aware, no other purpose than to get at
the real truth about them; in other words, to do them justice. That I
have not refrained from pointing out the deficiencies as well as the
excellences of their form of religion will show that my object has not
been to offer a mere panegyric upon them; they deserve better than that.
I shall attempt, in conclusion, to describe the kind of mind and
character produced by the influence of the ruling conception of Torah,
the Pharisaic ideal aimed at, and more or less realised in practice.
Individual Pharisees, of course, would present many and marked
variations from the type, just as is the case among Christians; and I
take no account of them, except to say that whatever may be true in the
matter of the common charges of hypocrisy, pride, self-righteousness,
and the like, is due to individual defection from the ideal, and is not
an inherent quality in it.
For the basis of such a description of the Pharisaic ideal, I take a
remarkable passage now included in the Mishnah, in the treatise called
the Pirké Aboth, or Sayings of the Fathers (M. Aboth. vi. 6). The whole
chapter, which is later than the rest of the book, is called "The
Acquisition of Torah." This is the passage:--"Greater is Torah than
Priesthood or Kingship. For Kingship is acquired by thirty stages
(_i.e._ there are thirty qualities necessary to the ideal King), and
Priesthood is acquired by twenty-four; but Torah is acquired by
forty-eight things. And these are they:--Study, the listening ear,
ordered speech, the discerning heart, dread, fear, meekness,
cheerfulness, purity, attendance on the Wise, discussion with
associates, argument with disciples, sedateness; Scripture, Mishnah;
having little business, little intercourse [with the world], little
luxury, little sleep, little conversation, little merriment,
forbearance, a good heart, faith in the Wise, the acceptance of
chastisements, [He is one that] acknowledges God, that rejoices in his
lot, that makes a fence for his words, that claims not goodness for
himself, that is loved, that loves God, that loves mankind, that loves
deeds of charity, that loves uprightness, that loves reproofs, that
shuns honour [_i.e._ when offered to himself], that puffs not up his
heart with his learning, that is not insolent in his teaching, that
bears the yoke along with his companion, that judges him favourably,
that establishes him upon truth, that establishes him on peace, that
settles his heart in his study, that asks and answers, that hears and
adds thereto, that learns in order to teach, and that learns in order to
do, that makes his teacher wise, that makes sure what he hears, that
repeats a word in the name of him who said it." The remainder of the
passage has no bearing on the general subject, being only a note upon
the last clause. The author is unknown. The list, which includes
fifty-one qualifications instead of the forty-eight announced at the
beginning, varies slightly in different editions; but it may be taken as
representing substantially the ideal character developed by and under
the religion of Torah. It may usefully be compared with the enumeration
of Christian virtues in Rom. xii.; and, if that comparison is made,
there will be noticed that difference of tone and spirit to which I have
already alluded. But it will also appear, from such comparison, that
there is no contrast as between black and white, hypocrite and holy. The
Pharisaic ideal may seem to be drawn in terms of more level prose than
the Christian ideal as set forth by Paul, and, moreover, to be one more
capable of being attained, in actual life. There is an element of sober
matter-of-fact in Judaism, and especially in Pharisaic Judaism, which
may not be sublime, but has great value, nevertheless, in the practical
conduct of life, even the religious life. Some of the items included in
the Pharisaic list may seem to be of but little importance, such as
those having immediate reference to the study of Torah--argument with
disciples, attendance on the wise, and the repeating a saying in the
name of him who said it. These, and similar items, have to be judged, of
course, by the standard of the supreme worth of the Torah. What that
meant to the Pharisee, how much more than the mere study of a book, I do
not now need to repeat, after all that has been said in previous
chapters. But many of the items indicate the great and substantial
virtues and graces which belong to the higher human nature alike of the
Pharisee and of the Christian. They include love to God, love towards
all mankind (let it be noted especially, that love is not restricted to
Israel alone), sympathy, kindness, forbearance, purity, meekness,
cheerfulness, contentment, patience under trial, and that which a great
Rabbi once said excelled all other qualifications for the perfect
life--a good heart. A man who should strive after such an ideal of
character and conduct would follow no unworthy quest; and, however
different be the form in which he expresses his religious ideas from
the form familiar to Christians, there is no fundamental difference
between them in the desire to seek God and serve Him with the noblest
powers that He has given to the human soul. It is not _quâ_ man, but
_quâ_ Pharisee that the adherent of the religion of Torah is sundered
from the Christian. There was in him the same human nature, capable of
high development in its relation both to God and to man. And the
conception of Torah was for the Pharisee the agent in that development;
while for the Christian the controlling factor is personal relation to
Christ. I am not concerned to judge between these two. I am concerned
only to maintain that the development of human nature through the agency
of Torah did in fact take place, and did produce very great and noble
results.
Pharisaism in history has had a hard fate. For there has seldom been for
Christians the opportunity to know what Pharisaism really meant, and
perhaps still more seldom the desire to use that opportunity. It has
served as a foil to Christianity, the way for such use being prepared by
the New Testament. Its supposed blemishes have been held up to view, in
order that the excellences of the Christian religion might shine the
more brightly by comparison. If learned men like Lightfoot, Wagenseil,
and especially Eisenmenger, explored the Rabbinical literature well-nigh
from end to end, it was mainly for the purpose of reviling what they
found there. And, in our own day, though there is no longer to be found
amongst Talmudic scholars the scurrilous rancour of an Eisenmenger,
there is still the inveterate habit of regarding Rabbinical Judaism as a
means of exalting Christianity; there is nearly always the criticism of
Judaism from the Christian point of view, and judgment given upon
premises which it never recognised. There is scarcely any attempt to
learn what it really meant to those who held it as their religion, who
lived by it, and who died by it, and have done for two thousand years.
Is, then, the Christian religion so weak that it must be advocated by
blackening the character of its oldest rival? And if it should appear,
as I trust in some degree it has appeared, that the religion of Torah as
held by the Pharisees was a real expression of spiritual experience, the
inspiration of holy living and holy dying, is the spiritual power of
Christianity in any degree made less? Why should the one begrudge to the
other whatever is good in it? Especially when the one has grown great
and has become the religion of many nations, while the other has
remained as the inheritance of a lonely people? Why should not the
Christian be glad to own that the Jew, even the Pharisee, knew more of
the deep things of God than he had supposed, and after a way which was
not the Christian way, yet loved the Lord his God with heart and soul
and strength and mind,--yes, and his neighbour as himself? The time is
surely come when Pharisaism should be recognised as a religion entitled
to be judged on its own merits and by its own standards; a religion
widely different indeed from Christianity in its methods and its forms
of expression, but yet a living faith, capable of ministering to the
real wants of human souls; a religion _sui generis_, but none the less
to be acknowledged as one among the many expressions of divine
revelation on the one hand and of human seeking after God on the other?
It is in the hope of helping towards such a sympathetic and unprejudiced
recognition of the intrinsic worth of Pharisaism that I have written
this book. What I have written is scanty indeed, in view of the
greatness of the subject; but it may yet have been enough to give some
idea of what Pharisaism meant to the Pharisee, and to show that the
Saints and Sages of Israel, those more particularly who are included
amongst the Scribes and Pharisees, were not what they have commonly been
called and usually thought to have been. Saints and Sages they were, who
served God faithfully, and found in the Torah His full and perfect word.
And to me, though not walking in their way, nor sharing in all their
beliefs, yet drawn to them across the ages, they have been the
companions and friends of many a year.
INDEX
Abahu, R., 265.
Abraham, 219, 220, 239.
Akiba, R., 32, 51, 52, 90, 153, 154, 249, 267.
Am-ha-aretz, 46-47.
Antiochus Epiphanes, 38.
Apocalyptists, 6.
Augustine, 90, 217.
Authority, seat of, in Pharisaism, 314-317.
Bacher, W., 232 n.
Bar Coch'ba, 50.
Belief, heads of Pharisaic, 251-255.
Character, Pharisaic ideal of, 326-331.
Christianity, a protest and revolt, 14.
founded on a Person, 171.
Circumcision, 30.
Common ground of Jesus and Pharisees, 116-127.
Conscience, function of, in Pharisaism, 314.
Corban, 141, 156-161 n.
Divorce, 141, 153-156.
Eighteen Benedictions (_see_ Shemoneh Esreh).
Eisenmenger, 332.
Elders, Tradition of the, 48, 52, 93, 135, 137, 229.
Eleazar, R., 211.
b. Dordaia, 212.
Eliezer b. Horkenos, R., 121, 159.
Elisha b. Abujah, 264.
Essenes, 6, 46, 48.
Exile, the, 8, 10, 64.
Ezekiel, 64, 134.
Ezra, 5, 7, 8-28, 62, 74.
Faith, 218, 219.
Father in Heaven, 120-124.
Gabriel, 263.
Gamaliel, R., 164.
Gemara, 54.
Germans, in the Talmud, 7.
God, Pharisaic conception of, 251-252, 259-267.
Goths, in the Talmud, 7.
Greece, influence of, 34-38.
Ḥaber, 107, 288 n.
Ḥaburoth, 107.
Haggadah, 91, 96 n., 226 and Ch. V. _passim_, 240-242.
Halachah, 27, 90, 91, 96-104, 189 n., 230, 231, 243.
Ḥasidim, 37-40.
Heaven, 254.
Hedge, for the Torah, 22, 26-28.
Hell, 254.
Hellenism, 6, 36-38, 208.
Ḥija, R., 5, 308.
Hillel, 5,49, 153, 164, 238.
Hypocrites, 165-167.
Ibn Gebirol, 285.
Jabneh, 49, 50, 51.
Jannai, R., 307.
Jehudah b. Baba, R., 51.
ha-Kadosh (_see_ Rabbi).
ha-Levi, 285.
Jesus, 112 and Ch. III. _passim_.
Joḥanan b. Zaccai, 49, 104, 121, 164.
R. (third century), 301, 306.
John the Baptist, 117, 128, 129.
Joshua b. Levi, R., 248.
Kingdom of Heaven, 117, 129, 130, 144.
Law (Νὁμος), 58, 183 n., 194, 195, 200.
Levites, 16.
Lightfoot, 332.
Logos, the, 264.
Lord's Prayer, the, 118.
Maccabees, the, 31, 36, 38-39.
Maimonides, 217, 235.
Manasseh, King, 213-215.
Mattathias, 38, 39.
Mediator, 259, 263-264.
Megillath Taanith, 45.
Meir, R., 52.
Memra, 264.
Merit, 276-279.
of the Fathers, 213, 279.
Messiah, the, 142, 143, 250, 253, 254, 256.
Metatron, 264-265.
Michael, 263.
Midrash, 55.
Mishnah, 48, 53, 54, 102, 158, 160.
Mitzvah (Mitzvōth), 103-104, 196, 197, 271-276.
Moses, 11, 60.
Nehemiah, 9, 13, 19.
R., 219.
Nicodemus, 196 n.
Particularism, 322-325.
Paul, 172, Ch. IV. _passim_, 266.
Pentateuch, the, 63, 94, 113, 228.
Persia, 34.
Pharisees, Pharisaism, _passim_.
Prayer, Book of Common, 304, 305.
the Lord's, 118.
Prayers, Pharisaic, 298-310.
Priest, the High, 44.
Priests, 132.
Prophets, the, 65, 73.
Psalms, Book of, 84-87.
Rab, 104.
Rabbi (Jehudah ha-Kadosh), 52, 249.
Repentance, 210-216.
Resh Lakish, 5.
Retribution, 267.
Reward, 267-276.
Sabbath, 30, 67, 104, 141, 146-152.
Sadducees, the, 6, 41, 43, 45, 48.
Sanhedrin, the, 21, 44.
Scribes (_see_ Sopherim).
Separation, policy of, 67-74.
Sermon on the Mount, the, 117-118.
Shammai, 153, 238.
Shechinah, the, 264, 274.
Shemoneh Esreh, the, 298-299.
Shulḥan Aruch, 231 n.
Sin, the Unpardonable, 150 n.
Sopherim (Scribes), 16, 17, 20, 21, 29, 31, 42, 92, 132.
Spirit, the Holy, 218-220, 264.
Synagogue (place of meeting), 29, 30, 31, 78-84, 207.
the Great, 18-28, 43, 89, 298.
Talmud, the, 3, 4, 7, 17, 18, 19, 25, 26, 27, 28, 54,
55, 77, 93, 115, 120, 122, 151 n., 154, 218, 226,
231 n., 248, 249, 260, 264, 284, 285, 298, 303, 304,
306, 321, 322.
Tanḥum b. Iscolastiki, 308.
Temple, the, 8, 30, 44, 48, 50, 80, 81, 256.
Theology, Pharisaic, Ch. V. _passim_.
Theology, Pharisaic, not a system, 233-237.
Torah, _passim_, but especially Ch. II.
meaning of the term, 58-61.
Tosephta, 53.
Tradition (_see_ Elders).
Uniformity of belief, not required, 234.
Unpardonable Sin, the, 150 n.
Vows, 157-159.
Wagenseil, 332.
Weber, F., 77, 126, 227, 235, 236, 260.
Wise, the, 50, 65 n.
Zadok, R., 159.
Zugoth, the, 21.
OLD TESTAMENT PASSAGES CITED
Gen. i. 1 75
i. 27 155
xv. 6 219
Exod. xii. 2 75
xiv. 31 219
xv. 1 219
xx. 1 238 n., 261
xx. 2 265
xx. 12 157
Num. xxx. 2 157
Deut. iv. 7 262, 274
iv. 30 214
xvii. 11 59
xxiv. 1 154,
xxviii. 63
2 Chron. xxxiii. 13 214
Neh. x. 8, 19, 67
Ps. i. 287
i. 2 275
xviii. 22 287
xix. 287
xxv. 10 287
lxii. 11 238 n.
ciii. 294
cxix. 287-297
cxix. 63 288 n.
Prov. i. 8 59
Isa. xliv. 6 265
li. 7 59
lxiii. 16 123
Jer. xxiii. 29 238 n.
Joel ii. 32 263
1 Macc. vii. 13 39
NEW TESTAMENT PASSAGES CITED
Matt. v. 17, 20 144
vii. 29 130
x. 29 262
xii. 32 150 n.
xxiii. 163 163
Mark ii. 7 168
iii. 1-6 146
iii. 22-30 149 n.
iii. 29 150 n.
vi. 34 47
vii. 1-23 156
vii. 5 48
x. 2 153
xii. 34 192
Luke iv. 23 117
xviii. 11, 12 301
John ii. 25 170 n.
vii. 19 195 n.
vii. 49 46, 323
viii. 32 316
xii. 42 196
Rom. i. 21, 24-25 182
iii. 10 182
iii. 21 183
xi. 1, 25 186
xii. 329
1 Cor. xiii. 311
2 Cor. v. 17 178
RABBINICAL PASSAGES CITED
1. MISHNAH
Megillah iv. 9 122 n.
Joma iii. 5 44
Sotah i. 7 117
ix. 121
Nedarim ix. 1 159
Aboth i. 2 22
ii. 13 305
iii. 15 267
iv. 5 273
vi. 2 317
vi. 6 327-328
2. BABYLONIAN TALMUD
Berachoth 9^b 117
10^b 279
16^b 302
17ª 274
33^b 267
Shabbath 13^b 134
Joma 85^b 152
87^b 301
Succah 20ª 5
Ḥaggigah 15ª 264
Kiddushin 39^b 274
Sotah 22^b 165 n.
Gittin 56^b 49
Nedarim 38ª 258 n.
Baba Bathra 12ª 65 n.
Sanhedrin 14ª 51
107^b 115
Abodah Zarah 3^b 58
17ª 212
19ª 275
Ḥullin 142ª 274
3. JERUSALEM TALMUD
Berachoth 2ª 306
3^b 238
7^d 306
13ª 260, 263
Peah 15^d 109
Shebiith 38^d 262
Joma 45^b 7
Moed Katan 83^d 150 n.
Baba Kamma 6^c 150 n.
Sanhedrin 28^c 213
4. MIDRASH
Bereshith Rabbah 52^b 117
89ª 104
133^c 246
Shemoth Rabbah 50^b 261
51^b 265
Debarim Rabbah 102ª 262
Pesikta d. R. Cahana 40^b 105
163^b 211
165ª _ibid._
Mechilta, Beshallaḥ 33^b 219
Tanḥuma, Bereshith 2^b 110
4ª 75
Tanḥuma, Noah 15ª 258 n.
Tanḥuma, Vajera 45^b _ibid._
Tanḥuma, Vajeḥi 110ª 218
Yalkut Shimoni (on
Ps. lxii, 11) § 783 238 n.
EDITIONS USED
Mishnah, Amsterdam, 1675.
Babylonian Talmud, Wilna, 1880-1884.
Jerusalem Talmud, Krotoshin, 1866.
Midrash Rabbah, Wilna, 1887.
Pesikta, edited by Buber, 1868.
Mechilta, edited by Friedmann, 1870.
Tanḥuma, edited by Buber, 1885.
Yalkut Shimoni, Warsaw, 1876.
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